I made the ribs exactly the way it said to and they were amazing. I loved that the prep was simple and took seconds to throw the sauce and meat into a pan, place in the oven and walk away! The smell in the house was torture as we waited for it to finish. My husband was like a little kid asking every half hour if it was ready yet. He loved every bite! Thanks for sharing!

I have cooked ribs so many ways, but this by far is the easiest for great tasting ribs everytime. I've cooked spare ribs, back ribs, country style ribs, St Louis style. Just use the ratio above for BBQ sauce and oj. Doesn't have to be exact can cook as many or as little as you want the only thing you might change is to increase the temp 10 degrees if you are cooking multiple slabs in a big pan for a party. Mine are usually done between 3 or 4 hours depending on how much I make. Can always cook a little longer if necessary for the right tenderness.
There is NO need to BOIL the ribs it does not help, it only kills the flavor. Follow this recipe above and you are set.
Btw: I do use a dry rub first, and I add a couple dashes of worstichire to the BBQ and OJ mixture.

I agree with the last few 'sane' posters. These ribs are delicious as the recipe is written. This will be the 3rd time making them. No adjustments necessary. To each his own, but why do people feel compelled to post an alternative recipe on someone else's recipe thread? Stupid! Start your own blog or thread somewhere else and if you don't like the recipe when you read the ingredients than don't make it. A shame you have to read through a wasteland of idiotic comments. Anyway, the recipe is delicious! Thanks for posting...my go to recipe for ribs for the past 2 years when making indoors and not grilling.

Arrogance is assuming that everyone should use whatever measurement you like. It's also good to know you're too lazy to look up conversions. Your country sucks even if you measure in metric. Excuse me, I'm going to go throw a fit that Nigella's site posts weights in grams and not ounces.

I don't like to cook meat in liquids, or wrapped up in run foil, because it steams the meat. On the contrary, I will salt the meat for at least an hour before, as this pulls water out of the meat and helps the proteins break down which results in more tender juicy meat and it will also draw in your other spices to penetrate. Trust me, your meat is juicy because of fat, not because of water or liquids. But this is just my preference for dry rubs. Interesting to use Orange juice for this recipe, I will def try that on a marinate some day

Many thanks for posting this recipe- I am trying it now, and hoping for the best. But having read through the steps, it seems strange that a recipe (especially on this site) would have a suggested cooking time of between two and four hours- that seems like a pretty broad range, and especially for pork. I see the different expected outcomes for each extreme, but what's the science behind essentially doubling the cooking time and still having an edible meal?

I am so excited to try this out. My husband is the rib king (on the smoker) in this house and have have to sneak this rib cooking session in while he's out of town, lol. All kidding aside, Ive never made ribs before so I am not sure if I need a rib rack or what the two pans would be used for?

>>two pans
it's just the physical size of the "rack o' ribs" you buy - a full rack is often long enough to hang out both ends of a pan. not good, use two pans vs. "double stacking" in the pan.

>>the science of cooking 2 to 4 hours
there's some science, there's some preference.
baking at (a) low-ish temp (300'F - personally I use 275'F) and (b) covered - gives you a lot more leeway in the timing - i.e. when "done" takes lots more time to go past "done" into crispy critters at 300' vs. 450', for example.

more science: depends on size of cut, thickness, amount of bone, temperature when going in the oven, color of pan, accuracy of oven thermostat, on a rack, not on a rack, probably a few other things I missed.

preferences: some people like ribs falling off the bone, some prefer them still stuck on the bone. longer / shorter cooking time results....

but then there's more science: some sauces are more "aggressive" at "tenderizing" meat than others - at the extreme and left too long, they can make mush meat. so if there a chemical tenderizing going on in addition to the cooking tenderizing, it goes faster.

I would offer the opinion there are very few cooking tasks where one should rigorously observe "times" -
boiling eggs
pasta
fresh corn
come to mind.

otherwise blindly cooking by the clock is very likely to bite.

Last edited by Dilbert on Fri Jul 13, 2012 12:34 am; edited 1 time in total

First, stop boiling your ribs people! It removes all actual meat flavor! Second, the reason for using foil is to keep the moist heat in resulting in juicy, flavorful ribs. I dry rub mine (sometimes I add apricot, peach or mango preserves), wrap in foil and cook on 200 degrees for 3 hours, turn the oven down to 170 and cook for another 2 hours. After that I unwrap them and layer with BBQ sauce and turn the oven up to broil for just a few min to caramelize the sauce. Perfect every time and easy clean up.

ok just got some high risk meat ya know the marked down stuff 1.49 a lb so i said yeah- baked on 300F 90 minutes. when i smelled the sugar getting too dark i added 1/8th inch water to the bottom of the pan .@ 90 minutes turned over did the same prep and upped temp to 425F till bubbly and then back down to 300F for the remainder of 30 min.

This is heavenly on lamb ribs but can't find em lately and if I could likely I'd have to take out a loan to eat em. So I have easy cheap pork and some quicky stir fry cabbage carrot and green onion w same spices (no molasses) on the side.

I have some pork ribs in the deep freeze and wanting to try this recipe. Do I need to thaw the ribs out first or can they stay frozen? If you tell me its okay to put them in the oven do I need to adjust the cooking time or anything?